The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1887-10-28

one of you that Is least to blame take
the first step toward Cancellation. The one
most In the wrong will never take it, Oh,
1t makes one feel splendidly to be able
by Gods help to practice unlimited
forgiveness. 1t improves ones body and
soul. 1t will make you measure three or four
more inches around the chest, and improve
your respiration so that you can take Deep
er and longer breath. 1t improves the coun-
tenance by scattering the gloom, and bright
ening the forehead, and loosening the pinched
look about the nostril and lip, and makes you
somewhat like God himself. He is omnipo-
tence, and we cannot copy that He is indie
pendent OF all the universe, and we cannot
copy that. He is creative, and we cannot
copy that. He is omnipresent, and we cannot
copy that. But he forgives with broad sweep
all faults, and all neglect, and all insults,
and all wrong doing, and in that we may copy
him with mighty success Go harness that
sublime action of your soul to an autumnal
sunset, the hour when the gate of heaven
opens to let the day pass into the eternities
and some of the glories escape this way
through the brief opening. We talk about
the italian sunsets, and sunset amid the APP
pennies, and sunset amid the Cordilleras.
But will tell you how you may see a grander
sunset than any mere lover of nature ever be-
held; that is, by finging into it all your
hatreds and animosities, and let the horses of
fire trample them, and the chariots of fire
roll over them, and the spearmen of fire
stab them, and the beach of fire consume
them, and the pillows of fire overwhelm
them. The sublimest thing God does is the
sunset The sublimest thing you can do is
forgiveness. Along the glowing banks of
this coming eventide let the divine and the
human be concurrent.
Again: We should not let the sun 90 down
on our wrath because it is of little Importance
what the world says of you or does to you
when you have the affluent God of tho sunset
as your provider and defender. People
talk as though it We're fixed
spectacle of nature and always the same
But no one ever saw two sunsets alike,
and if the world has existed 5000 years there
have been about 81 600 sunsets, each of
them as distinct from all the other pictures in
the gallery of the sky as Titians Last Sup
per-" Rubens' Descent from the Cross"
Raphael's TRANSPORTATION" and Michael
Angeles LAST Judgment are distinct
from each other. If that God of such
infinite resources that he can put on the wall
Of the sky each night more than the Louvre,
and the Luxembourg, and the Vatican, and
the Dresden and Venetian galleries all in one
Is my God and your God. our provider and
protector, what is the use of our worry
ing about any human antagonism! If we are
misinterpreted, the God of the many colored
sunset can put the right color on our action.
II he can afford to hang such masterpieces
over the outside wall of heaven and have
them obliterated in an hour, he must be very
rich in resources and can put us through in
safety. If all the garIriture of the western
heavens at eventide is but the upholstery of
one of the windows of our future home, what
small business for us to be chasing enemiesl
Let not this Sabbath sun 60 down upon your
wrath.
Mahomet said: 'The sword is the key of
heaven and hell, 6pp Of blood shed is bet
ter than fasting, ami wounds in the day of
Judgment resplendeDS as vermilion, and odor-
ferrous as musk" but, my hearers, in the
last day we will fiod just the opposite of
that to be true, and that the sword never un.
| locks heaven, and that he who heals wounds
is greater than he who makes them, and that
on the same ring are two keys: Gods for.
giveness of us and our forgiveness of enemies
and these two keys unlock Paradise
And now wish foa all of you a beautiful
| sunset in your earthly existence. With some
of you it has been long day Of trouble, and
with others of you it will be far from calm
When the sun rose at 6 o'clock it was the
morning of youth, and fair day was
prophesied, but by the time the MONDAY OF
mid life had come and the clock of YOU
earthly existence had struck IL, cloud racks
gathered and tempest beloved in the track
Of tempest. But as the evening of old ago
approaches Ipray God the skies may brighter
and the clouds be piled up into pillars a.
Of celestial temples to which you 60, OF
move as with mounted cohorts come to taxi
you home. And as you sink out of sight be
low the horizon may there be radianct
of Christian example lingering long aftel
/ you are gone, and on the heavens be writ
ten in letters of sapphire, and on the water,
in letters of opal, and on the hills in letters o.
emerald: "Thy sun shall no more go down
neither shall thy moon withdraw itself, fol
the Lord shall be thine everlasting light anC
the days of thy mourning shall be ended.
So shall the sunset of earth become the sun
rise of heaven.